[for photographers] before & after :: out on the farm

This image was taken last fall from Sarita's fashion session, and I thought it was a great time to bring it back for an editing post.

Sarita stood in the entrance of a barn for this shot. Any time you can stick someone in a doorway or just under an overhang, do it! It makes for some gorgeous open shade lighting that is so easy to photograph. The light is pouring in evenly from one light source (the barn door), and it is at the perfect angle, lighting the front of her face instead of the top of her head.

First, I brought the image into Camera RAW, fixed white balance (was way too warm), and applied my custom preset. My custom preset has everything at zero except for a little pop in brightness and exposure.

Best editing advice I ever received was from David duChemin's creativeLIVE. He said to start from scratch, getting rid of all of the automatic settings that the computer gives your image. Start everything at zero, and build up from there. Has made my editing so much cleaner!

Then, I moved the image into Photoshop. After retouching the skin, I added several curves layers of contrast, brightness, and cross processing, burned the edges, and sharpened the eyes. And that's it!

You can see the three steps below :)

P.S. Have questions? Post them below in the comments or ask them over on my formspring page!

P.P.S. I would love to hear how I can make these posts more useful to you! There is just so much that goes into editing. I am trying to find that balance of giving useful information without making a ridiculously long blog post. Any suggestions would be amazing! Just leave them in the comments :)